What do these road signs show?

Explanation

The priority road continues from the junction to the left.

On the right of the picture two elements are mounted on one post: a yellow diamond with a white border meaning "priority road", and directly beneath it a plate drawing the layout of the junction ahead. On this plate the thick line comes up from below — that is, from the very route you are travelling on — and turns to the left; the straight road and the road to the right are drawn with thin lines. A thick line is always the priority road and a thin line the minor road.

The practical message of this combination is vital: you are on the priority road at present, but the priority road does not continue straight through this junction. If you go straight, you have left the priority road and at that moment you no longer have priority; you must give way to vehicles travelling on the priority route. Conversely, if you turn left you have stayed on the priority road and priority is yours, although you are obliged to signal left.

The safety reason for this plate lies exactly here. Most drivers' mental assumption is that "going straight means continuing on the same road", and on that basis they enter the junction without reducing speed. When the priority road turns, that assumption proves false and the result is a side impact in the middle of the junction — the most crash-prone pattern at urban junctions. The direction plate is posted precisely to break that assumption.

• If the priority road continued both straight and to the left, the plate would have to show the thick line in both directions; but in the picture the straight continuation is drawn with a thin line and only the left branch is thick.

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